


A Call to Arms

by Meatball42



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Crossover, Dark, Gen, Historical, Moon, Nighttime, War, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-08
Updated: 2019-11-08
Packaged: 2020-11-28 01:43:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20958380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meatball42/pseuds/Meatball42
Summary: "A shady ‘independent agent’ who only makes contact with an MI6 agent who’s been around since our dads were fighting over here, suddenly wants to meet you and only you, deep in German territory. And that doesn’t make you suspicious, not at all?”





	A Call to Arms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Huntress79](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huntress79/gifts).

> Reality disclaimer: Very little WWII research went into this fic.

A thick mist rolls through the forest as Steve and Bucky come to a stop at the meeting point. It’s midnight, and only a sliver of moon glows weakly behind thin clouds.

Bucky frowns at the surrounding forest, upset about the low visibility even though they shouldn’t be at risk of running into any German patrols. Completing his 360 sweep of the area, he looks directly at Steve, and frowns harder.

“We shouldn’t be here,” he says, for the fourth time.

“This is the only place the Valkyrie would meet,” Steve says, for the fourth time. He chafes his gloves together for warmth, then decides to do a check on all his gear.

Bucky stands completely still, except for the deepening scowl. “Exactly. A shady ‘independent agent’ who only makes contact with one specific MI6 agent who’s been around since our dads were fighting over here, suddenly wants to meet you and only you, deep in German territory. And that doesn’t make you suspicious, not at all?”

Steve sighs heavily. “I don’t like it either,” he admits, “but Peggy says he’s always delivered good intel in the past.”

“_Agent _ Carter’s never even met the guy,” Bucky retorts, emphasizing Peggy’s title just enough to get Steve’s back up.

“I was at the briefing, too, you know,” Steve says with a glare.

Bucky takes a sudden step forward, so that he and Steve are face-to-face. “And it didn’t seem to get through your thick skull that this could be a trap!”

Steve has known Bucky for long enough to tell when he’s actually angry, and when he’s just trying to make Steve see sense. This is the latter—but that doesn’t make him right. 

“I trust Peggy’s judgment,” he says calmly. “She said that the intel’s related to Hydra, that this is the first time the Valkyrie has shown willing to make contact with another agent in decades. I’m not letting this opportunity pass us by. We’re staying.”

Bucky works his jaw, and the nod he gives is tight and disapproving, but he goes and covers Steve’s back. 

They don’t speak for a while. They’re early, but a spy of the Valkyrie’s caliber would surely plan his approach carefully. Bucky watches to the South and Steve the North while they wait.

The cloaked figure approaches from the East, silently enough that they don’t notice him until he’s only forty or so feet away. Steve suspects that the crackle of underbrush that alerted them was intentional; the figure’s already-raised hands confirm it.

Slowly, the figure draws back the deep hood of his cloak—or rather, her cloak.

“Valkyrie,” Steve greets.

The woman nods. In another time and place she might have been beautiful. Now, she looks tired and haunted, like most of Europe. But her eyes are as sharp as any Steve has seen.

“How do you know I am not a messenger?” she asks.

Her accent doesn’t sound like German or British or anything Steve’s learned to recognize in the last few years. But he has already recognized something else.

“You look like a soldier.”

“Many people look like soldiers, these days.”

“_Are _ you the Valkyrie?” Bucky asks bluntly.

The woman turns dark eyes on him. Steve feels Bucky tense at his side.

“If I were the Valkyrie. If I told you that your target, Zola, was going to be visiting Dusseldorf in two days time. What would you do?” 

“My team and I would bring him in,” Steve says firmly. He means to ask if that information is true, but the woman, presumably the Valkyrie, continues.

“What if I told you that, at the same time, there was to be a marching of prisoners? That thousands would die.”

It’s a test, then. Steve takes a deep breath. He never liked these kinds of things, hypotheticals about real human lives. But too many of the hypotheticals have become harsh realities. He’s come to understand their value, at least.

“I would pass that intel on as soon as possible to the regular Allied Forces. It's not our jurisdiction. My team focuses on Hydra, currently.”

“And if it were a matter of delivering that information, or capturing your enemy?”

“That's what radios are for, ma'am,” Bucky says, on the wrong side of impolite.

Unoffended, she retorts quickly. “You do not have a radio, do you?”

Before Bucky can fire back, Steve asks, “Are you saying there _ will _ be a massacre within the next few days?”

“Not a massacre,” the Valkyrie answers, returning her strange gaze to Steve. “A slow, painful death for thousands of civilians, over days or weeks. But if you do not act, they will be lost behind enemy lines.”

“Behind enemy lines isn't enough to turn me away,” he assures her.

“I hear you are a superhuman, Captain. An Übermensch, some might say. But this is not a battle you can win by yourself.”

“I’ve heard that before,” he says firmly. “It didn’t stop me then.”

Silence. An owl hoots in the distance. The Valkyrie watches Steve with her dark eyes, waiting.

“What is your choice?”

Steve thinks, hard, trying to find a way out of the puzzle, but he's only delaying the answer he already knows.

“I'd save the civilians.”

“Even if they were all German?” she presses.

“Why would the Germans kill their own people?” Steve counters.

“Why would Americans kill those native to their land? Why would they put those born on their own soil in camps?”

She starts walking toward them, slowly. Steve senses Bucky’s hand going to the gun at his belt, but he doesn’t pull it. Yet.

“Do you know what you are fighting for, Captain?” Valkyrie asks, her head tilted to the side.

Steve straightens up. “America isn’t perfect, not by a long shot. You aren’t wrong about that. But Hydra doesn't care about nationality, or race. They don't care who they hurt. They only want power.”

The Valkyrie scoffs, the first sign of emotion she’s shown. It startles Steve. “So your side is bad, but the other side is worse?” she challenges.

Steve answers her earlier question instead of arguing that one. “I don't care if they're German citizens. I'd choose to save them.”

Bucky pulls his weapon partially out of its holster and the Valkyrie stops approaching. She’s only a dozen feet away now. If she weren’t nominally an ally, she’d already be dead, in these woods.

“What is your message, Valkyrie?” Steve asks firmly.

From the depths of her cloak, she pulls out an envelope, slowly, locking eyes with Bucky as she does. “This is for your Army,” she tells them. “The march begins in two days, at noon. You will need to move quickly.”

Steve steps forward and takes it out of her hand, carefully not getting between her and Bucky. Some sense he doesn’t have words for tells him that the Valkyrie could be dangerous even to him.

She turns to leave.

“What about the other intel?” Steve says quickly.

“What other intel?”

“About Zola?”

The Valkyrie looks back over her shoulder. “You will not be able to capture him if you intend to rescue the civilians.”

“Then we'll use it to inform our understanding of his movements.”

She doesn’t move; this time, in hesitation rather than a considered pause.

“I made my choice,” he vows. “I’ll do what’s right.”

She turns back and gives him another envelope. As she does, she smiles, and it transforms her face from that of a dour, tired spy, into that of an angel. Steve's mouth drops open, as though he might speak, but anything he might have said is trapped in his throat.

“I know you will. Steve.”

She leaves. Her near-silent footsteps vanish quickly into the misted woods.

“You ready?” Bucky prompts him. “We should move.”

“Yeah,” Steve agrees. They fall into a practiced pattern, moving rapidly back in the direction they came.

Steve keeps a careful eye and ear on their surroundings, but inside his thoughts are awhirl with the Valkyrie’s words and the look on her face. There was something vital about her, something that reminds him only of the moment Erskine's serum was pumped into him, in the moment where his insides were seared with such fire that the pain of his body was nearly eclipsed. The Valkyrie was hyperreal in the same way.

And then the precious envelopes stowed safely inside his coat crinkle, and his focus returns to the darkness of a German forest and the bloody realities of war.

He hopes he’ll meet the Valkyrie again. But right now, he has work to do.


End file.
